Page 41 of Crush
At some point, he’d been hit. She hadn’t protected him well enough. Her muscles froze with guilt and horror as much as the leaching chill of space.
But she grabbed his hand, extra tight to counter the slippery ichor. Bracing her free hand on the robot, she heaved with all her weight, helping him scramble free of the robot.
For an instant, he sagged backward, as if he were about to fall into the hollow again. He toggled something and then leaped free, lifting her with him.
And wings flared out from beneath the shell of his carapace.
The iridescent bronze, like dragonfly wings, unfurled twice as long as he was tall, gliding them in a shallow arc away.
The robot continued to shamble toward the gap in the hull where the invaders—emboldened by the lack of return fire—had attached giant hooks reaching through the hole. The hooks stabbed into the robotic shell, right where Teq had been.
He landed badly, crumpling, and though she tried to hold them both upright, she barely managed to keep him from faceplanting into the laser-scored floor plates.
Somewhere in the back of her head, that blinking light was strobing so fast it was almost solid red. It told her they didn’t have time to get to the main corridor.
From behind him, she wrapped her arms around his wide chest, the wings sagging limp over her own shoulders. Holding him tight, she chocked her heels in the scarred floor, pushing with all the big muscles in her thighs. Dammit, she could’ve chosen some little green man from the IDA matchbook, but noooo…
She lunged back once, twice, a third time, and her spine slammed into a lumpy barrier. Ollie’s rock.
It hadn’t seemed very big when it was mounted under the lights in the secondary bay, and it seemed even smaller now as refuge against the void. But here they were, and her legs were quivering and her arms felt stretched to disjointed and her head pounded—and her heart ached even more.
“My crusher,” she murmured. She flattened her burned and bloodied palm over the glyph on his torso and let out a breath at the empowering rush through her, as if someone had distilled into one essence the energy of coffee, the pleasure of chocolate, the thrills of ghost in the graveyard—and the love of a man who had reached for her as she reached for him.
The last of the air whispered out around them as the invaders yanked the robot out into space, clearing a path for their raid. Teq wrapped one hand behind her neck and pulled her down for a kiss.
And as the bomb he’d sent out to the pirates exploded, the darkness of space ignited around them.
***
Adeline.
The voice nudged at her. But she was sleeping so peacefully. It had been forever, it seemed, since she got to sleep in. Usually she had to roll out of bed like a thief, soak the tear tracks from her swollen eyes or do her makeup to cover any bruises, get breakfast started…
No, wait. That was done, had been done for a while. Except for breakfast. Pancakes were forever—
“Oliver!” As she bolted upright, another word burst from her. “Teq!”
“Mommy?” From the blankets spread beside her, Ollie lifted his head. “Did you have a nightmare?”
She wanted to laugh or cry or both. “No. No, owlet. It wasn’t a nightmare. It’s a good dream because you are here.”
As she hugged him close, she gazed over his sleep-tousled hair. “And you’re here too.”
From his seat across the med bay, Teq gazed at her. “Because of you.”
She wasn’t ready to put Ollie down, not after she’d almost lost him, but she looked over the big crusher as if she could use her hands. “You were hurt.”
“Barely a scratch.”
Ollie twisted his head to blink up at her. “He was bleeding all over the place when he carried you out of the bay. But I only screamed a little. He said I could scream for him while Sil glued him back together.”
“Maybe your screaming helped stick the synth skin.” Teq crinkled his eyes and widened his lips—those lips she’d kissed—around his tusks. It was basically a smile.
June bustled in, Sil right on her heels. “Adeline! You’re awake!”
“How’s your head?” Sil held some sort of scanner near her. “I think we cleared the concussion, but you might be a little sore. Would you like to go back to your quarters?” He set aside the scanner. “Or would you rather wait here until the IDA transport comes?”
She froze, and it felt as if the entire universe froze with her.
